Older sibling bullying the younger...

Anyone have problems with the older sibling bullying the younger? Lydia is 2yrs and 2mnths older than Aiden. Up until about 2 months ago she was all sweet to him, loved him. Out of nowhere she has become so mean to him. She tries to boss him around, telling him he can't do stuff while screaming at him. Snatching things from his hands while yelling no. She even is physically mean to him. She pushed him into a dresser once and he ripped his frenum, which the dr said it would tear or need to be cut anyway, but still. She tries spanking him. She took his cup away from him last week and got up on the sofa where he couldn't easily reach and every time he tried to get it she would kick him down. He's gotten into his "bye-bye" stage so he likes to try and go into the front room where the door is and yells "Bye-bye!!" throughout the house (he's afraid of the step so he never actually goes outside if he manages to even get that far, lol). The other day he went to try his little "escape" and she tried pushing him out of the doorway yelling at him, when Husband grabbed her and put her on the sofa she began kicking at him, screaming. This morning they were eating breakfast at their table when Aiden walked off to get a toy (he like to stuff his mouth and then walk off to play for a few min) and she tried snatching the toy, I told her to give it back and she yelled "Aiden eat!" when she finally let it go he went to get more food and was walking past her plate, just walking past it, she grabbed him and pushed him on the floor yelling "My food!!!"
Nothing we do works. It doesn't matter how many times we tell her or how we tell her, talking to her does nothing. We will talk to her about It and she'll turn around and do it again. No form of discipline works. We've tried everything. If we tell her to go in her room she fights about it and when she does go she sits in the doorway crying and won't stay there more than 5min. If we put her in the corner or in a chair she screams the entire time.

I'm at a loss. I don't know what to do. Does anyone else have this problem? Could this be a behavioral thing we need checked out? It's so upsetting to see, Aiden loves her so much and she's just so mean. 😞

Comments (4)

Sibling issues are so, so normal. Maddening, but normal. And, for what it's worth, my kid will often scream the entire time he's in a time out, too. It drives me a bit batty, but it also shows me that it's a good consequence because he is clearly upset by it and working through his feelings without hurting anyone. And if he gets up, I calmly put him back without making eye contact, even if I have to do it every 7 seconds for the whole 3 minutes.

As far as some suggestions to help curb the behavior?

Big kid special time each day with either you or Dad when your baby is napping or busy with the other parent - 15 minutes uninterrupted time doing whatever she wants to do.

When she's being aggressively over protective, remind her that you guys are the mommy and daddy and she's the big sister. It's your job to keep little brother safe, and her job to teach him to play lots of fun games and how to be a good friend.

Physical aggression is an unemotional and absolutely automatic time out, followed by a talk and apology to little brother. Point out if little bro cries, gets hurt, and ask her how her actions made her brother feel.

But mostly, time...my kids (3&6) still fight, sometimes a lot, sometimes it's physical, and my 6yo definitely still tries to parent his brother. But he also used his scary yelling voice to scare off a playground bully that hit my 3yo and they say they're BBFFs. (Best brother friends forever). Sometimes fighting is part of a sibling relationship, I figure it's better than indifference, right??

It sounds pretty normal to me. Choose a punishment method and stick with it. Even though my kids fight often, they still love each other. My 3 yr old has been missing her brother so much since he is now in full day Kindergarten. They are fighting less when together now, because they have time to miss each other.

Mine are 2 years 4 months apart and my older son is so rough on the younger one (mostly pushing him over). He is jealous of the time we spend with the youngest, and at the same time he's trying out all sorts of new behavior on him. It's so hard to discipline because nothing seems to stop it. I think we just have to be really consistent. It happens so frequently as my older one is constantly running around and bouncing off the walls, that I don't do a time out for little things, but I probably should. Sadly, the younger one has started to pull the older one's hair, so it's been hard to explain that. I'm pretty sure the older one knows the behavior is wrong but isn't able to control his impulses and have empathy. So we're working on explaining what his little brother feels, asking the older one to tell us how that behavior made his brother feel, etc. By the end of the day I'm so exhausted! Funny thing is, when little brother is asleep the older one is so much more well behaved... We do one on one time as much as possible.

Thanks for sharing OP (original poster) and others. It's good for me to hear of other people's experiences to know I'm not alone.

I knew sibbling issues were normal, I'm youngest of 3 and my husband is oldest-middle of 4, 2 youngest in which are like 18mnths apart. I just didn't know them being physically mean, especially this often and aggressive, was normal! I asked my mom if me and my sibblings were like this and she said no, we were mean but not physical, so I was worried something could've been wrong. 😭

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